Palazzo Lanfranchi, lungarno Galilei

Palazzo Lanfranchi _ Museo della Grafica (G. Bettini, Comune di Pisa)

In 1820, the building was bought by Andrea Vaccà Berlinghieri, founder of the School of Surgery. His wife, Sophie Caudeiron, transformed the palace into a place of culture, organising literary and scientific salons that attracted poets, artists, politicians, travellers and exiles: from the Shelleys to the most illustrious Fanarioti, supporters, from Tuscany, of the Hellenic cause. During the Pisan stay of Mary Shelley, Andrea had the great opportunity to meet her and, on the occasion of her second visit in 1820, invite her to the palace to participate in galvanism experiments secretly carried out in the most hidden rooms of the palace. According to a local tradition, with echoes as far back as the United Kingdom, it was thanks to the Pisan doctor that Mary made some important changes to the novel Frankenstein published in 1818, but released in second edition in 1831. The fame of the Italian Frankenstein grew even more with the construction of the Temple of Minerva Medica in Montefoscoli (Pisa), wanted by Andrea to commemorate his father Francesco Maria: a place full of mystery and masonic symbols, which attracts many occult scholars every year. After Andrea's death in 1826, Sophie dedicated herself with passion to the education of her three children, taking an interest in the pedagogical methods of P.E. von Fellemberg, and in the management of the family patrimony, especially the estates of Orzignano and Montefoscoli, obtaining trust and social consensus at the time rare for a woman.